I know but one way of fortifying my Soul against these gloomy Presages and Terrors of Mind, and that is, by securing to my self the Friendship and Protection of that Being, who disposes of Events, and governs Futurity. He sees, at one View, the whole Thread of my Existence, not only that Part of it which I have already passed through, but that which runs forward into all the Depths of Eternity. When I lay me down to Sleep, I recommend my self to his Care; when I awake, I give my self up to his Direction. Amidst all the Evils that threaten me, I will look to him for Help, and question not but he will either avert them, or turn them to my Advantage. Though I know neither the Time nor the Manner of the Death I am to die, I am not at all sollicitous about it; because I am sure that he knows them both, and that he will not fail to comfort and support me under them.
From: The Spectator #7, by Joseph Addison, published on Thursday, March 8, 1711. Republished in: The Spectator: Volume 1: No. 1, Thursday, March 1, 1711 to No. 80, Friday, June 1, 1711; the Text Edited and Annotated by G. Gregory Smith, with an Introduction by Austin Dobson (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1897), pp. 30-31.
The Spectator, published in 1711 and 1712, was one of the first urban newspapers, or opinion journals, in the modern sense of those terms. Joseph Addison (1672-1719) and Richard Steele (1672-1729) were the writers and editors of this paper, which appeared several times per week. The collected editions of the paper, usually republished in 8 volumes (as in the edition listed above) have been republished many times during the last nearly 300 years.
